Comic Book Resources

Given the seedings, it seems like this should be called the “X-Men region”.

Here are my votes, same criteria (character plus story engine) as before. Again, as before, my evaluations will be based on the Bronze Age (Here defined as 1970-1985) continuity.

1. Iron Fist: A very, very tough call. Logan is a great character with a fantastic story engine (espionage plus military plus mutant), but, after re-reading the Essential Iron Fist, I think that the BA Fist slightly edges past Logan with his Lost Race meets Kung Fu meets pulp meets Superhero story engine.

2. Colossus: No contest. Rasputin’s farm boy charm and X-Men story engine combine to easlily outclass the White Queen, who is just another evil BA telepath, with only kinky lingerie to distinguish her from the rest.

3. Ariel: Very, very, very tough call. Darkseid is a brillaint creation (And a gift from God via Kirby to DC;what would DC do without Kirby’s work for them in the 70s?), possibly Kirby’s best post-SA achievement. However, as the ultimate evil, he is a bit one note in terms of character, while the BA Kitty is a very realistic depiction of a 13 year old girl becoming a mutant superhero.

4. Nightcrawler: No contest. Kurt outclasses the BA PG as both a character (Kurt’s religiosity plus lack of angst over his looks against BA cardboard) and as a story engine (Mutant hero vs. Earth TWo Supergirl knockoff).

I am so sick of the word “cardboard”.

Cardboard is awesome! You can make all kinds of cool stuff with it.

Jesus Trajan you really like the word “cardboard.”. And the voting isn’t based on only their time in the bronze age; I don’t know if you saw this but dick Grayson was said to be “Batman” and that took place like a year ago so… Yeah.

High flier, I limit my evaluations to a given era in the interests of levelling the playing field. For example, Superman and Batman have been continuously published since the Golden Age, while Captain America and Namor have both experienced signicant hiatuses. Please note that Brian said that we may use any criteria that we desire. As the phrase “cardboard” seems to anoy some people, I will replace it with “stryrofoam.”

That should be “annoy.” I do need to check more closely for typos

What’s with all the cardboard hate all of a sudden? it’s durable, versatile, and in the end, biodegradable. Nothing wrong with that….

(And hey, trajan’s free to make his picks any way he likes. He has just as much right to base his choices on the specific time period given as I do to base mine on a combination of nostalgia and the pure entertainment value of the character’s entire run. Just like everyone else has the right to annoy everyone by bitching about how we decide our votes.)

*ahem*

My votes, and my criteria….

1: Iron Fist. Wolvie’s been overexposed for years now, and “Power Man and Iron Fist” was one of my favourite comics growing up. Besides, he can summon his chi and channel it so that his fist becomes like unto a thing of iron! Beat that, Logie!

2: Emma Frost. Partly because of the whole “villain to hero” arc, and partly due to the wardrobe. I’m not proud.

3: Kitty Pride. She’s always been my favourite X-Man, while Darkseid has often been a one-note villain. A loud and glorious note, sure, but still just one note.

4: Power Girl. Tough call, but on the whole, Power Girl has had more entertaining storylines, pound for pound, than Nightcrawler has.

I went with my Uncanny X-Men love here choosing Logan, Colossus, Kitty and Nightcrawler…. One of the books that got me started in comics…I can’t deny the great effects they had on me…

Cardboard is the epitome of Anti-Life.

“I don’t know if you saw this but dick Grayson was said to be “Batman” and that took place like a year ago so… Yeah.”

Hmm…well, if we were looking at “Prodigal” Dick as Batman, then it might still work…

BTW, Colossus vs. the White Queen? Really? A character who has the maturity of an eight year old (and boy did that get old for me after about 170 issues or so) vs. a throwaway telepath villain…hopefully they both disappear by the elite eight….

This round was pretty easy. I’m not much into Iron Fist, but I am so sick of Wolverine, who stopped being good by the late ’80s.

C’Mon everybody! Let’s make the vote unanimous for Kitty!

Wolverine is almost as institution. Iron Fist is a cool character, but c’mon (This being the Internet, I’ll not be shocked if the C-lister wins, though).

Wolverine is a no-brainer to me. Iron Fist is a fine character, but Wolverine is so robust that a trained monkey could bang out a solid Logan story.

Emma Frost over Colossus is a closer call. Neither is a great character, but Emma has more growth potential and that counts for something.

I know that Kitty Pryde was the the imaginary girlfriend of an entire generation, but she really works best for me as an observer. That is second banana territory. Darkseid, on the other hand, is a Top Five Baddie. He has distinctive enough body language that you could “do” Darkseid in Charades. That puts him on a tier with Superman, Wonder Woman, Spider-Man and a handful of others.

I like both Power Girl and Nightcrawler, but PG is the only one that could motivate me to pick up a solo title.

I really like Iron Fist, but had to go with Wolverine… in fact I went X-Men all the way down the line, even though I couldn’t really believe I voted against Darkseid.

Sorry to disappoint you Mary, I voted for Darkseid. Only Doom is more iconic for me.
He’s not always been handled the way I would like, and he’s been weakend by over exposure. But like Dean said “Top five Baddie” – though I am trying to figure out how I would do him in charades. I think I would need those hooker boots of his to really pull it off.

wolvie is overexposed but it really is who’d win inna fight.
Iron fist doesnt stand a chance who cares how many books wolverine is in.
I cant stand white queen so i went with colossus.
sorry kitty i went with darkseid ( but im starting to regret that)
sadly powergirl won cuz the old nightcrawler would be too busy trying to ask her out on a date.

these things should be all about chartacter.
for instance im gonna go hypocrite here but im a huge spidey fan and if it was spidey against thanos, darkseid and galactus hed run away and somehow bring back supes the newgods, the cesetials, thor, the starlin era avengers, thing and still win cuz he is that awesome.

“Wolverine is so robust that a trained monkey could bang out a solid Logan story.”

Well, that finally explains who’s been writing Wolverine for the last two decades.

I guess it depends on what you mean by solid, though. Personally, I find Wolverine to be very one note. I do appreciate that he can regenerate form a single atom, of course, and that he’s the best he is at what he does, but I don’t think a convoluted back story is a satisfying substitute for depth of character. I like him okay in a team setting, but… for me, there’s no there there.

Well, here’s how I went with it:

Iron Fist. I voted for both these guys in the first round, but bottom line is I’m not that interested in Wolvie, whereas I’ve always been a big fan of Iron Fist. No contest here for me, really.

Emma Frost. Didn’t vote for either of these people in the first round because I’m pretty tired of the X-Men, but while Piotr’s a nice guy & all, he’s also pretty boring. Emma almost by default.

Darkseid. I know everyone loves Kitty, often to an almost creepy extent, but come on. Overexposed as he’s been lately, Darkseid is about as awesome as villains get, in every sense of the word.

Power Girl. Kurt was my favorite X-Man back when I was 12 and still reading that book, but I stopped caring about him around the time Excalibur started up, whereas I love Kara more and more as years go by, and her solo series is fantastic. So sorry Kurt, but it’s an easy call here as well.

If kitty was up against almost anybody else I’d'a picked her, but against Darkseid? I agree w/everyone who agrees with me.